


Everything

by Caedmon



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Post-Episode: s02e04 The Girl in the Fireplace, Slow Dancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-15
Updated: 2016-01-15
Packaged: 2018-05-14 03:30:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5728045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caedmon/pseuds/Caedmon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After GitF, Rose's confidence is shaken. The Doctor asks her to dance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everything

**Author's Note:**

> Written for an anonymous prompt: _things you said when you were the happiest we ever were_  
>  I also incorporated the ficlet prompt: _Ten/Rose, Angst, "please forgive me"_
> 
> As always: I own nothing but the mistakes. Those are mine.  
> Kudos and comments are the life blood of the muse.  
> Come talk to me! caedmonfaith.tumblr.com

Rose sat at the table in the galley, staring into her tea as if it would answer all of her questions. When it didn’t, she stirred it a little, but nothing happened save a little dimple of a whirlpool. 

She dropped the spoon and brought her hands up to cover her face, fighting tears. 

How had it come to this? Well, that was a bit of a silly question, she knew the answer to that: she hadn’t been good enough. She never could be. She’d been the best she could be for him, though, she’d tried to be clever and impressive. She loved him with every fiber of her being, and she’d thought maybe he felt something for her. He certainly had seemed to for a while there. Rose’d thought she was special, somehow. She’d thought that she meant something to him, something more. 

So naive of her, really. Of course he’d had other companions. She was surprised and ashamed that this surprised her. She should have known - of course, in nine hundred years, he’d had friends who traveled with him. But Sarah Jane had seemed so close to him, seemed to love him so much. It had been jarring to see the older woman in love with the man she also loved. Would that be her? Grey hair threatening while she still pined over an alien? 

And of course, then he was presented with a woman so beautiful and accomplished that she was famous throughout history, even three thousand years into the future. And of course that woman clearly wanted him, how could she not? Reinette Poisson was much more of what the Doctor deserved. She was everything Rose was not... Was it any great shock that the Doctor had snogged her, danced with her and then invited on board to share his life?

“No,” Rose said aloud, answering herself. It really wasn’t. At least, it shouldn’t have been.

“I didn’t dance with her, you know,” the Doctor said from the doorway. Rose looked up at him leaning against the door jamb, his hands shoved in his pinstriped pockets, looking at her with sadness and speculation.

“The hell you didn’t,” Rose mumbled. Then she cleared her throat and spoke more loudly. “You came back to the space station, dancing, with wine in your hand and your tie around your head.”

“Rose. Come, now. Surely you saw that for the distraction it was. And the wine wasn’t wine, it was anti-oil, I told you.”

“So you’re saying that you didn’t dance with her?”

“Not in the way you’re thinking,” he replied, then took a few steps into the room. “I won’t say that she meant nothing to me, Rose, because I was fond of her.”

“You hardly knew her, Doctor! And yet you snogged her.”

“Exactly.”

Rose shook her head in confusion. “Exactly?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

The Doctor sat down across from Rose, folding his hands on the table. “Rose, I didn’t snog her. She snogged me. I should have stopped it before I did, I know, but I didn’t initiate any contact with her.”

“What about her reading your mind?” Rose scoffed. “And then dancing with her. It feels appropriate to say ‘it takes two to tango’ right now, Doctor.”

“The telepathic link was necessary, and I never dreamed she’d have any abilities. I would have fortified my mind more if I had known. And as far as going to the ball with her...I was stunned, Rose. First I was looking around in her mind to try to find why those androids were after her, then the next thing I knew she’d been rifling around in my own mind. The next thing I knew after that, she was dragging me into a ballroom. It all happened so fast, Rose, and I didn’t want any of it.”

“You could have left if you were so miserable.”

“I did,” he said simply. “I explained to her that nothing was happening, nothing would ever happen. She accepted that after a time. And do you know why, Rose?”

Rose shook her head, wiping the tears away.

“She saw _you._ She saw you in my mind and she knew. She knew what you are to me.”

She shook her head again, and the Doctor reached across the table and took her left hand in his. 

“Oh, Rose. You really don’t know, do you?”

“What don’t I know?”

“What you are to me.”

Rose huffed a laugh. “I’m your companion. The latest in a long line.”

The Doctor sat silent for a minute, staring at her, contemplating. Rose didn’t look at him, didn’t want to. If she did, the tears would fall, and she hated for him to see her weak. Finally, he spoke. “Dance with me, Rose.”

“Excuse me?”

“Dance with me,” he repeated, standing up with her hand still in his. He tugged it when she didn’t respond immediately, and he pulled her hand to his chest, tucking it between his hearts. He took her other hand and held it loosely, down beside them. The TARDIS began to play soft, slow music and the lights dimmed.

“Do you remember the first time we danced?” he asked, his voice low.

Rose nodded. “After the blitz.”

“You were right, Rose. I had captain envy that night. Oh, I was so jealous. He had held you in his arms and danced with you, and that was all I wanted out of my life; you in my arms. Finding out about the two of you dancing was the tipping point for me.”

“What tipping point?”

The Doctor didn’t answer her, just looked at her intently, a small smile quirking the corners of his mouth. 

“Even if I had danced with Madame Du Pompadour, I wouldn’t have held her like this, Rose.”

A tear slipped down her cheek. The Doctor brought her right hand up and around his neck before wiping her tears and wrapping his free arm around her waist, keeping her left hand firmly against his chest.

“Do you remember what I told you that night?”

“The night we danced?”

“Yes.”

“You said a lot of things.”

“You remember, Rose. I know you do.”

“You said…” She paused, gathering her thoughts and swallowing hard. “You told me I was the most beautiful creature you’d ever seen.”

“And?” he prompted, still looking at her, his brown eyes soft but steady.

“You told me that meeting me was the best thing that had ever happened to you.”

He nodded. “I meant that, Rose. I wasn’t just saying those things because I was so happy, so overwhelmingly happy to have you in my arms.” 

Her head rocked back and forth in a silent denial. She refused to meet his gaze, fat tears spilling from her eyes.

He brought his hand up from her waist again, sweeping the tears away with his thumb then looping a finger to tip her chin up. “I did mean that. I still mean it. You’re the most important person in all of time and space to me.”

Rose closed her eyes against his gaze, not knowing what to do. She’d believed him that night; it had been the happiest she’d ever been in her life. She was afraid to believe him now. He wrapped his hand around her waist again and pulled her closer.

His tone changed, now he sounded imploring. “Please forgive me, Rose. I need your forgiveness. When I think of what I’ve done to you…” he squeezed her hand against his chest. “Rose, my hearts will never recover from seeing you cry because of what I did to you. The last thing I ever want is to hurt you, in any way.”

She nodded, her eyes still closed. He brought his cheek down to hers, and she felt the soft scratch of his beard: he hadn’t shaved that day.

“Rose?” he asked.

“Yeah?” she whispered.

“Remember when I mentioned that the night we danced was a tipping point?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you want to know what I fell into that night?”

She nodded against his cheek.

“Love, Rose. I gave up the stupid internal struggle I had, trying to keep from falling in love with you and just let it happen.”

Rose let out a little sob and he pulled her closer. “That's not quite the response a bloke hopes for when he tells the object of his affection he’s in love with her.”

She huffed a watery laugh this time, and buried her wet face into his shoulder. He didn’t seem to mind.

“Rose?”

“Yeah?”

“Remember how you said I hardly knew Reinette, but I’d snogged her? I said ‘exactly’ in response.”

“I remember.”

“Have you ever known people who snog anyone who comes along, because it doesn’t matter? They don’t care about them?”

Rose nodded against his shoulder.

“Have you ever wondered why I didn’t snog you?”

She nodded again. 

“Because this means everything to me.” He released the hand he was holding to her chest, but she kept it there, feeling the steadying double-beat suddenly increase in speed. The Doctor leaned himself back a bit to take Rose’s head from his shoulder. Once she did, he repeated his earlier action of looping a finger under her chin, raising it. His eyes fluttered from her eyes down to her lips and back up, before he closed them and pressed his lips to hers. 

They were cool and soft sliding against her own, and Rose felt herself trembling. The Doctor caressed his lips with hers, more softly than Rose ever could have imagined. And oh, she’d imagined this. She’d been imagining this for a year, the way he would taste, the way he would feel, the way he would smell. 

He parted his mouth, nibbling and sucking lightly at her lower lip. When she opened to him, he pressed his advantage, darting his tongue into the open space. Hope and comfort and love flared in her mind, and she whimpered a little. He deepened the kiss at the sound. 

She felt him splay his hand wide across the small of her back and release her chin so he could cup her face, tucking her ear into the place between his thumb and forefinger and letting his fingers thread through her blond locks as he cradled her head, holding her close to him. Rose slipped her hand up around his neck, returning the favor by carding her fingers through his hair.

The Doctor’s tongue slid against hers - but this was no battle for dominance, no struggle of wills fought by two mouths. This was supplication and absolution, pleas and responses, craving and satisfaction, adoration and love. 

He pulled away after a time, resting his forehead against hers and closing his eyes. Rose felt a little out of breath and was gratified to see that the Doctor was, too. 

“I never snogged you because I was afraid, Rose. I was so terribly afraid. You’re so beautiful and perfect; you’re my everything. That’s what Reinette saw, she saw how in love I am with you, how much I need you. But I’m the worst possible option for you,” he whispered. 

“You don’t get to decide that, Doctor,” she replied. 

“It could never mean anything with anyone else,” he went on, “because no one else is as precious as you are.” The Doctor bumped her nose with his, teasing her a little.

“I love you, Rose Tyler. Can you ever forgive me?”

Rose nodded. “I forgive you and I love you.”

“Fantastic,” he said, right before his mouth closed over hers again.

**Author's Note:**

> The Doctor and Rose danced to [this song.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9ayN39xmsI) It felt fitting to me.


End file.
